


Pray, Love, Remember

by archea2



Category: Hamlet - Shakespeare
Genre: Angst and Humor, Fluff and Angst, Gertrude is here too, Getting Back Together, Grief/Mourning, Letters, M/M, Politics - Court intrigue (or the academic version thereof), Sort Of, Treat, academia au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-04
Updated: 2019-11-04
Packaged: 2021-01-23 02:29:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21312685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/archea2/pseuds/archea2
Summary: “Badiou,” Dr. Polonius dribbles on, undeterred. “Bah!” Then he lets a sly side eye follow Horatio’s gaze up the Board of Notice, and chuckles.“No wonder you’re distracted. Bit ghost-like, eh?Metaphysics 101: King, Hamlet.Half the Common Room did a double take. It’s the son, actually.”
Relationships: Hamlet/Horatio
Comments: 10
Kudos: 38
Collections: Multifandom Tropefest 2019





	Pray, Love, Remember

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sombregods](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sombregods/gifts).

> An eleventh-hour treat for a wonderful prompt!

The Elsinore College of Philosophy is every bit as beautiful as it is awful - in ye olde sense that it knocks your socks off with awe. At least on Orientation Day, at least until one of the parents wanders off and up to the ancient citadel’s roof (now a gardened terrace), takes a plummeting look down below, and says _ Oh my _ in a drained voice.

Not to worry, sir or madam. It’s not every campus that lords it over the North Sea, but look! here is a wall and there a sentry walk, to say nothing of a CCTV camera to keep the young hopefuls from skinny-diving between classes. King saw to it when he planned his garden with the loving care he gave to everything Elsinore, back when the place was still a few ruined walls and a twinkle in his eye. But he had what it takes to make a dream come tall, did King - the last of his kind with the guts and genius to coin an entire thinking system, now Descartes and Kant and poor Wittgenstein have all gone pschitt, innit? _ Innit_, boy?

Horatio blinks alert. “Um, sorry?”

“Badiou,” Dr. Polonius dribbles on, undeterred. “Bah!” Then he lets a sly side eye follow Horatio’s gaze up the Board of Notice, and chuckles.

“No wonder you’re distracted. Bit ghost-like, eh? _ Metaphysics 101: King, Hamlet _. Half the Common Room did a double take. It’s the son, actually.”

Tight nodding from Horatio. He knows. Knew the father, his Ph. D. advisor up to last July, and consequently knows - well, used to - that is - Biblical slang aside -

“Back from his Erasmus year,” Dr. Polonius breaks off blithely. “Wittenberg, that is.” A pause, before the stubborn old voice shrills itself to a peak. “Bavaria, innit? Claudius - Doctor King, that is, our current lord and master - set it up in his V.P. days. Enjoyed the trips, I dare say, and the local hangovers. He, he. _ The wine in Rhine slays mainly in the “brine” _, as we used to quip in my younger days. Quite the connoisseur, His Lordship - did you get a sip of the Saint-Estèphe up here? Staff only; bottom-shelf sherry for the dads and mums. Of course, with Brexit upon us, it’s only a question of months before the Erasmuses go pschitt too. in fact, my son is pleading right now for an extra semester at La Sorbonne, and -”

“If you’ll excuse me, sir. I think I’d better report to Doctor King.”

“Go north, young man.” And Polonius, one ear eternally perked to his own wit, waves him off. “It’s all zest and jollity up here. And claret.”

He’s not wrong. The rooftop party is still hoopla-ing when Horatio steps in, his heart beating with more wings and tremor than the gulls making their rounds overhead. There’s more noise than he recalls from last summer, when he and Hamlet paced the green nook together, careful to keep their voices low until King Sr. woke from one of his naps in the little vine bower (the mind’s sabbaticals, he called them) and smiled at his son over a riot of lavender. Now there’s a king-size glass cooler on his chair, a cigarette butt snuffed out in the lavender. Horatio bends to retrieve it.

“Ah, Horatio,” Claudius King - the late King’s brother, now Horatio’s supervisor in all capacities - booms out. “Come and join the inner circle. Have a glass. Have a cold plate. Everybody, Horatio - my loyal young assistant. Met Laertes yet? He’s off to Paris for another bout with Lamord - that’s right, _ le _ Lamord, France’s Man in Metaphysics - with our funding and blessing. And this is... oh, but I forgot. You two are long-found friends.”

Horatio’s had thirty-odd steps to prepare himself. But all they did was pump his heart preemptively, so it could gasp all the louder. Gasp at Hamlet’s tall form, once gangly, now standing lithe and apart in full black cap and gown. (He alone. It’s an Indian summer start of term, prompting the usual crumpled linen in all but Hamlet, who is not even breaking a sweat.) _ Oh my_, Horatio’s idiotic heart blurts out.

“Fellow students,” Hamlet edits, staring at some point north-north-west of Horatio.

“Quite,” Claudius says affably. “And as of now, fellow instructors. I wish you’d follow Horatio’s steps, Hamlet, and let me see to your viva. It’s what your dear father would have wished. The King is dead, _ vivat _ the King - with a little help from me.”

Horatio winces. Hamlet stares. After a while, when it becomes clear that every eye but the oxeyed daisies’ is on him, he speaks again. “I don’t know, Uncle. It’s still very soon, and… and I really wish you’d let me stay at Wittenberg the whole year.”

“An Erasmustn’t, my boy. And if you won’t do it for me, then do it for GERT.” Pause. A wink, that layers _ silky _ over _ ingratiating_. “Don’t you want your father’s life project to see the day in print? I have an offer from Routledge worth a King’s ransom, ha ha, but I’ll never make the deadline without your help.” Another pause, pregnant with more meaning than Horatio can parse from Claudius’s flushed cheeks and Hamlet’s self-absorbed grief.

“...Whatever it takes,” Hamlet finally says.

“Good! Better than good! Gentlemen, a toast. I give you - Hamlet and viva! _ Vivat! _”

“Vivat!,” a few academics chime in, whether in tribute to their new principal or Pavloved by Latin, Horatio cannot say. Hamlet, he knows, drinks to GERT.

GERT. For “Global Ethics Reevaluation Toolbox”, i.e. King Senior’s mammoth essay on moral philosophy, still unpublished. Horatio was only let to access snippets for his own thesis, but they were the fuel that kept him writing. Not that King didn’t have contradictors. “Reevaluation” kicked a bunch of academic ole boys right in the ‘nads, all of whom ran for the pitchfork (save Jacques Derrida, who smiled cheshire catly and said he knew better than to deconstruct a Thor). Old Fortinbras spearheaded the Opposition - Horatio still recalls the Warsaw symposium and Professor King on the stand, felling objections right and left until Fortinbras was left sputtering something on the line of “But, _ morals! _”. To the crammed auditorium, it had sounded like “Uncle!”.

Speaking of…

See, GERT was King’s life partner after he lost his wife, young Hamlet still a toddling mop of dark hair. He cherished his program, not for the kudos he might reap at an age when philosophy, much like Beckett’s Winnie, is a three-quarters-buried old thing (Dr. Polonius, that cynic). But for GERT’s own dear sake. He treated it with kid gloves; nurtured it, much as he cared for his son and his garden, until it bloomed into unbridled beauty (like his garden) (like his son), page after page of crisp-clear arabesques entrusted by him to one (one!) flash drive.

For King’s Achilles heel was his paranoia. He _ did _ think in terms of foes. Told Polonius once (who told all and sundry) that he didn’t trust Dropbox or any form of Internet archiving, and kept that single, peerless record of GERT close to his heart of hearts.

Day and night.

Come what may.

Only, no longer. Because death came to King in this very garden, a sea and half a land away from his son; July then, September now, with GERT lying in another man’s chest pocket. So much did Hamlet predict to Horatio on their quarrel night, his face run down by tears that burnt themselves into Horatio even as they piled up words between them. Words, words, words, corrosive too, each speaker harshed by the other’s anger.

_ You can’t, not you, you’re my man, never his - how can you - that’s betrayal in sheep’s clothes, Horatio _

_ You’re being fucking offensive, you know that? _

_ That’s rich. That’s dirty rich, coming from  
_

_ I have to complete my thesis! Look, I’m still breaking my heart over your loss - and mine, Hamlet, and mine - but I have to be pragmatic. They’ll break out the red carpet for you at Elsinore, but I _

_ So you’re choosing him? That… turkeycocker? That joker? Who hasn’t had an idea of his own since he found he could slap a metaphor on a 49-pence self-help app and voilà, philosophy by numbers... _

_ Fuck’s sake, Hamlet! It’s easy for you to  
_

_ Oh, is it _

_ It’s not like I have a choice, however you spin it  
_

_ After Dad. After two years of knowing him, listening to him, each word true and good _

_ Your dad is gone! He’s gone, okay? Christ, it’s not like he’ll ever again climb a platform and speak to us, even if he wanted to! And I wish, sweetheart, I wish  
_

_ You don’t get to call me that _

_ I don’t? I don’t? _

_ No. You don’t get to - pledge yourself to that thief _ and _ me.  
_

_Oh my god, are you_ _listening to yourself? It’s like you’ve forgotten who I_

_ No, I haven’t. You were father’s other disciple, and you’re my friend, my lover too, and I wish you weren’t _

“There we are,” says Claudius King. He thumps Horatio on the back, takes his hand back and lets it undulate two inches above Hamlet’s left shoulder. “I look forward to our joint opus. And to all of us, I wish a pleasant first term.”

_ wish you weren’t _

He thinks Hamlet’s eyes are on him now, their clear grave black (night-clear, Horatio once called them, dipping his gaze to Hamlet’s face (lying open under him, flushed with those sweet abrasions (every single time (from their first celebratory rutting, when they got their MAs))) guarded. But when Horatio turns his head, Hamlet is staring at his black patent shoes.

He inhales the lavender’s sharp note and thinks back to limetrees, their warm western tang seeping through the windows at the International Students’ Gasthaus. July, the cruellest month. Memory, meet desire.

“Thank you, Doctor King,” he says, the words ashes on his tongue.

* * *

There is a bounce to the first weeks, not unpleasant. Horatio’s student days are still close enough that he can pick it up in his freshmen when they herd themselves into his classes, and mimick it to his best.

It’s Elsinore, after all. Even at love’s summum, Horatio missed it. Missed that corridor in the East wing, left board- and poster-free on King’s orders, so each promotion can cover it with words and ideas and then whitewash it themselves (always a fun party) before moving on. Missed the whiff of heated curries and heated discussions about noon, when the haggling over rooms and schedules gets going. 

“Not that I object to the stairs,” Rosencrantz tells him, panting, a bevy of young hopefuls in his wake. “Very… healthy… and a nice callback to… Wittgenstein’s somaesthetics. But if my first period is in G304, why are they putting me in B101 for the next? It’s the same class!”

Horatio, jogging up alongside, only nods. A nodding acquaintance will do with Rosencrantz - and Guildenstern, the Thomson to his Thompson, both junior lecturers here, though Horatio still wonders what made King hire them. They’re pleasant fellows, to be sure; but it only took the autumn months for Horatio to notice Ros’s habit of parring any enquiry as to his research field with “Oh, it’s the _ minor _ Kant for me”, or Guil giving the same written test to all his sophomores, never mind the day, hour or subject.

Not that Hamlet seems to care. He still greets them, not with his wiseguy face, but with the smile that warms his features like a blush, and used to be Horatio’s alone.

Nowadays, Horatio’s path only brushes with Hamlet’s in the Common Room, where Hamlet can be found glaring the Expresso maker into obedience. Horatio strains his voice to a “Hello”, Hamlet answers a nod. The Expresso maker, now an overachiever, spills hotly over their cups and fingers. It _ doesn’t _ bring back fond memories. It _ doesn’t _ make Horatio long for yesterday’s Hamlet, who would have launched a naughty quip and a suck at Horatio’s fingers, not stood there with expressionless eyes while Horatio makes weather talk.

A bad break-up, in Horatio’s (allegedly limited) experience, comes with a multiple identity disorder. Currently, it is splitting him into three or four Horaselves. One is all thirst -for coffee, for comfort, for Hamlet to stop being so damn untouchable at close range. One is boiling-point angry at Hamlet’s blank eyes, while another insists on being reasonable about the whole business and talking of the russet sky. And one is taking the other three to task with _ But I did betray him. He _ should _ have got custody of GERT, hang age, hang tenure, and I didn’t say so; because I could have it both ways, be a tutor here and be there for him, and look how well that worked.  
_

… The thing is, if you’re writing your thesis on the ethics of care, then it’s on you, at some no longer hypothetical point, to practice what you preach.

Like, pay attention to Hamlet.

Like, notice that Hamlet still closes his eyes when drinking a too-hot cuppa. “Here,” Horatio says, and prises the styrofoam gently loose so he can take it to the water cooler.

Hamlet doesn’t say anything. But October is on its last legs, and it’s only a matter of days before Horatio finds himself in the Copier Lounge, taking shelter from Polonius’s drone (the man is a living, _ talking _ reversal of Pascal's “frightening silence stretching infinitely into indefinite space” - the man is a compacted blabbermouth) when Guil sidles up to him.

"I say," he says. "Did you hear about Hamlet's latest?"

Horatio, who hasn't, shrugs.

"Made a Guinness bid for the shortest 101 essay topic in Metaphysics," Guil says. "_ Being. No-being. Interrogate _. Can you picture the ickle froshies queuing up at King's door for his head?"

"Can you picture them," Horatio riposts, "having a field day with it? I know I would."

He moves his eyes from the ever-dysfunctional toner - none of these great minds have bothered jogging up the stairs one more time to warn Supplies that it needs changing - and stills. Guil is looking… guilty. No, wait. Narrow it down, like Guil’s eyes, parsing his face. Guil is giving him a Look, screened by tufts of yellow eyelashes, that says Horatio parring his dig was the last thing he thought to hear from his co-worker. Like… he expected Horatio to slam Hamlet. But why? Hamlet, as far as Horatio can tell from earshot (Hamlet’s teaching comes with an open door policy), is a hell of a pedagogue. 

He says so, and watches Guil exit. Counts ten and then, on imperceptible second thoughts, looks into the corridor. He is quick enough to catch Guil’s rap to the last door on the right - the Principal’s office.

* * *

Later, on the spur of the moment, he grabs a sheet of colour draft paper. It’s pink (well, rose), but it’ll have to do.

_ I don’t know how to tell you this and not come across as a nutty tattle-tale _ , he writes. _ And I haven’t forgotten what your father told us the day he introduced us to each other - that when you meet a person, even if you like them, you have to put trust in them in order to know them. I know that I have lost your trust, and I rue it every day. But today something weird happened. And I feel that it would be wrong not to share it with you. _

So he does, as soberly and specifically as he can.

_ This may be nothing_, he adds. _ But - I don’t know. Just, take care, okay? H. _

He leaves his note in Hamlet’s (locked) pigeonhole. On Friday, upon returning for his class on Moral Perfectionism, there’s an answer. It’s also on rose paper, and Horatio’s mind trips him with an old quote, a saying or a song, or maybe a proverb - _ rosemary is for remembrance_. He shakes it off and unfolds the sheet.

_ Not a thing of nothing, and I shall take your words to heart_. Then, a pause, unseen as the words carry on seamlessly, but palpable in the shift of tone. _ Horatio, I need to apologize. What I said to you that night - that was wrong. You had to make a choice and it couldn’t be perfect, of course it couldn’t, and what I did was blot out the background of your choice. You never had the opportunities I was given, and you did not have the luxury of turning down my uncle’s offer. You agreed out of necessity, whereas I did because I couldn’t bear to part with this place or let him have full sway over GERT. So why should I so confidently hold you to a standard I myself couldn’t reach up to? Or claim monopoly on a loss that was your loss, too, that orphaned you all over again, only I was too self-absorbed to see it? All I did was offend you, and for that I’m sorry. _

Horatio closes his eyes, the rush of joy burning his heart. Careful, he admonishes himself. Don’t run to him yet. He needs to know he’s not alone, but he’s still vulnerable, my wild Hamlet, he had a major part of himself ripped away and he needs to piece himself back together before he factors me in. Still - and his hand is already reaching for a page.

_ No offense, I swear. And, yeah, I feel his loss - but when loss comes to you a second time, it finds you prepared, sort of. I was ten when I lost my dad, and I still remember being dazed for weeks and months on end - like a chief belief had been struck down in me, Copernic-wise, and I’d been told the sun would no longer run circles around me, or the stars would stop burning and turn dead. So why did I forget it that night? I should have hushed our row. Or maybe I should have let you roar yourself out, and then I should have given you my breath, my voice, my arms, whatever you needed. I failed you that night. I failed you hard, and I never want to do that again. _

* * *

Hamlet no longer smiles at Guil and Ros. If they wonder why, less power to them.

But smile he does. To Horatio, when they greet each other mid-stairs, or across the entrance yard, where the sweet alyssum blooms purple between the flagstones. To his students, over his shoulder, even as his marker covers the white board with fierce intent and the Cartesian tree of knowledge. Like Descartes, Hamlet is testing a new center of equilibrium, watched by Horatio at a fond distance.

They still haven’t spoken directly, but their notes speak for them, little pink ventriloquists. 

* * *

_ Heard you showed up in class with a Mexican sugar skull, then proceeded to eat it. Let me guess. Epicure’s take on death? _

_ Got it in one. Sugar won’t keep, all life is ephemeral, let us pluck its pleasure when we can. Nearly broke a teeth, hope I made a dent. (Next time, tell me to go for marzipan. Remember the little marzipan pigs on the Wittenberg market, that you ate by the dozen?) _

_ Not a dozen, mein Herr, you had half a share! Yes, I remember. I remember everything. By the way, there’s to be a charity waffle stand next Friday. I think young Ophelia’s officiating - P’s grand-grand-daughter. Don’t forget to buy one and boost their ethics-fu. _

_ I stand waffled. Ophelia P., baking? All I ever see her do is sing Amy Winehouse ditties. Gloomily. Interminably. And she’s old P’s daughter - I should know, as he makes a point of reminding me. Probably sings at home, too, so she can get a word in edgewise. _

_ No! Are you kidding me? Oh god, no wonder he keeps emailing us to keep the door ajar during our tutoring sessions. Or ban all creative poetry. Speaking of, I miss yours. You should write a haiku or two for the Christmas party. Just stay clear of _ beauteous breasts_, this time _.

_ BEAUTY IS BREATH, Horatio. How many times?! _

_ My dear Horatio, _

_ The term is flying so quickly, and so busily for us both, that we have barely had time to discuss your thesis. Perhaps it’s time we did, and approached a few other issues. Would you be agreeable to Monday, 7 p.m., my study? There’ll be an apéritif to make up for the late hour. _

_ With all best wishes, _

_ C. King _

* * *

King’s study (formerly H. King’s study) retains traces of its previous owner: the two floor-to-ceiling bookcases, once baptized Gog and Magog by a cheeky Hamlet, and the copy of Pissaro’s _ Nut-Tree at Erigny _ gifted to King by Marta Nussbaum on the occasion of a conjoined symposium. But the desk is all its new owner’s - papered over with mail and drafts.

In other circumstances, Horatio wouldn’t be ethically above stealing a peep. He has left two requests with Claudius, citing the late King’s promise to let him access the section of GERT on ethical responsiveness, and Claudius… has not responded. Which _ is _ a bother, as Horatio’s thesis relies on a thorough review of existing theories, and can’t very well afford to skip on King’s.

But Horatio’s mind is not on his thesis. It is still on Hamlet’s stricken face, Hamlet’s tense body, interposed between Horatio and Claudius's door a second before the former's preliminary knock.

(“Don’t go in,” he’d whispered, stepping into the gap. “Please, please, don’t see him tonight.”

Desperation to his tone, and Horatio had fumbled for words, but this - this _ crowding _ by Hamlet’s strong planes, Hamlet’s voice, freshly warm from his mouth, after weeks and months of starvation...

“Hamlet,” he’d mouthed back, one hand splayed to the wall, only a sliver of his brain assessing the door’s resilience.

“He’s going to tempt you, one way or another,” Hamlet said, his lower tones wild but - thankfully - low. “Make you tell him all about us, our letters, our…” He’d pushed himself up against Horatio, and fuck if Horatio’s heart wasn’t going mad in his chest.

“Look at me. Hamlet, look at my mouth” - chapped from the first bloom of cold, human, scant of breath. “Not gonna turn on you - unless you want it to.”

“O God,” from Hamlet, who’d looked as if he would kiss on the spot. Instead he’d taken a step aside, stiff-legged, and said, “Find me when he’s done with you.” There had been some somber undertone to the words, but Horatio had been too gone to care.

“Yes. _ Yes_. Where?”

“The roof. I have a key to the door, I’ll leave it open for you. We never told... Dad gave me a duplicate so I could join him in the late hours. He thought best at night.” And Hamlet, choking on the last words, had turned away and lunged at the corridor, Horatio watching for the black gown’s last flick round the corner before he’d knocked.)

Has Claudius heard them? The door is solid - Scandinavian oak, the late King's favorite. Now Horatio sits, a Martini untouched before him, and listens to Claudius hemming and hawing at the pages - which, he sees now, are his, sent four weeks ago to his supervisor. Good stuff, Claudius says, good stuff. Promising, yes, serviceable, not yet. Soon, if Horatio will only… but Horatio’s mind is drowned by his heartbeat.

“Sir,” he said, more to haul himself to firm land again. “I don’t know if you’ve got my request about, er, Professor King’s chapters…”

“Ah.” Claudius doesn’t raise his voice, but Horatio finds his mind snapping to attention.

“Is… can I ask if you have a publication date, sir?”

“That would be the thing, wouldn’t it?” Claudius is doing what he does best, which is to monologue at someone. Self-absorbed intimacy that doesn’t say its name, so you can never be sure if he is addressing you or himself, which in turn makes any venture a potential breach of courtesy.

“... Sir?”

“I’m seeing big,” Claudius murmurs, three quarters for himself. “I owe my brother no less. And Routledge - let me show you the whole picture here, Horatio. Routledge will only reach out to the _ fringe_. What about the rest? Eh? What of the little people out there, in need of guidance, but without the time or means to invest in Hamlet King’s Mammoth Book of Morals? We need to live with our time - a perspective that, sadly, escaped my brother. A great man, but an outdated man. Here. Take a look at this.”

A page rattling out of a printer, into Horatio’s hand.

_ The Humane Factor: Be a Better You! _

_ A Thought A Day Will Keep the Sophists Away _

_ The Actual Philosopher’s Stone _

_ Other, Schmother? I Think Not! _

And so on, and so on. All of them followed by King**™**. Horatio blinks harder.

“Self-help apps,” Claudius muses, stroking the neck of the Martini bottle. “_Very _ much in demand. Easy, accessible, cheap. Of course, it would mean simplifying the original text, which, let us be frank, gets quite muddled in parts. _ Nihil de mortuis_, but I have it on good authority that Ham’s heart was not his only… glitch. Very sad. So, yes, nip and tuck - nip a _lot_ \- and see what can be salvaged, and, ah, adapted for the great public, if I can find the right amanuensis.”

Horatio brings his glass to his lips. The Martini tastes sour and sticky, but it gives him the necessary time to blank his gaze. He’s had months of watching Hamlet go expressionless in public, when not in class; it doesn’t take a Marcel Marceau to mimic him.

“An assistant? But I thought Hamlet… I mean, the other Hamlet…”

Claudius leans forward across the desk, all confidence. The letters have paid off, Horatio thinks - Claudius actually believes him and Hamlet to be on bad terms. Not-speaking terms, at least.

“Oh, Horatio. Haven’t you noticed? Hamlet… is not in a good place. Dear me, no. A very bad place indeed.”

Horatio divorces his face from his heartbeat. “Oh?”

“I have had… reports. Several. That skull business? Terrible taste, Horatio.”

“Oh, I don’t know, sir. Of course, low carb sug -”

“Then, there’s his personal hygiene. Mind over matter is all very well, but you’d think he would at least wash his socks or zip up his fly before entering a classroom.”

Horatio thinks back to Hamlet’s body, a sum of _ pure _ and _ hard _ and _ unmatched _ only ten minutes ago; his gown and cap impeccably uncreased; his cologne a rival to the herbed wine in the old Tristram tales; and frets at the mouth.

“But, sir, if he’s wearing a gown I don’t see how -”

“Trust me, there are things even a gown can’t hide. As I said - reports. And it gets worse.” Claudius’s eyes flash with a tangerine glow: a cat on mouse duty, out to mesmerize. “This must on no account be repeated. But Doctor Polonius tells me - and we’re lucky he’s kept it sub rosa - that Hamlet has made, or is about to make, sexually explicit advances to his daughter.”

The next minutes are not worth repeating, least of all to Hamlet.

“... Needless to say, he’s been equally unstable when it comes to editing his father’s work.” Claudius’s gaze spiders back to the list of app titles. “In fact, downright _ un_reasonable. He is my nephew, but I abhor nepotism - always have, always will - and I will not favor his oddities. If I listened to him, it would be _ years _ of labour before we could make GERT profitable. No, I fear that I need a new co-worker.”

“...”

“You are a very astute young man, Horatio. And I for one like to give bright young things their chances - if I can be assured of their loyalty.”

_ And that’s a King?! _crosses Horatio’s soul as he holds the tangerine gaze with his own blank eyes.

“Go now. And, Horatio?”

“Yes, Doctor King?”

“Should you see Hamlet in the near future… keep an eye on him, will you? And keep me briefed. It’s too late to do anything before Christmas, and I’ll need all the testimonies I can get if I am to… reroute him to a place better suited to his mental health. Any whimsy… any… peculiarity… should be mentioned to me. Daily. Directly. Are we clear?”

“Yes, Doctor King.”

“Good! Excellent! Now, about your PhD Bursary. I have the papers here, all spic and span, and I see no reason not to extend…”

* * *

He finds the door open and the stairs his, to be taken two at a time with absolute resolution, stumbling if needs be. Then onto the roof, where the night-clear air envelops him, pure and salty with a strong touch of wind. The wind is blowing Hamlet’s dark hair off his forehead and temples, the wind is showing Horatio the way, once he catches his friend’s hand and tugs him across the lavender patch. Its purple has blended into the dark, but it is still richly aromatic; its scent pointing Horatio to the bower and its seat - Professor King’s old chair - and into the seat he maneuvers Hamlet, before dropping to one knee.

“What are you -”

“Hush,” Horatio says, kneeling. (Penance, allegiance: all one to him.) “Can I put my head in your lap?”

Hamlet chokes; nods wildly; bring their entangled hands to Horatio’s head, making Horatio a sharer in the following caress. Horatio presses his mouth to each black-clad thigh.

“Mine?” Hamlet asks, rough-spoken, like he barely trusts the word.

Horatio answers him. And _ yours _must be another secret key, because Hamlet is poking at his arms, a prompt for Horatio to rise again and straddle the lap he’d laid his head on. Hamlet’s arms are all grip, fastening Horatio to him as they rock into each other, two ships on a tidal wave. It should be sexual and it is, sort of, yet more like rubbing their hearts together. Tumescent hearts, gorged with grief, and relief, and the heat of reunion that sways them to and fro, to the seat’s benevolent creaks.

“Why the heck are we doing this in Dad’s chair?”

“Because it’s yours,” Horatio says between kisses. “Not - not that man’s. And we can stop if you’d rather, but your dad… I don’t think he would mind. He told me, once....” _ Anything goes, that alters us in the way of unselfishness. _“And then, he winked. You had your back turned to him, but the wink went to you by way of me, and, don’t laugh, I felt kind of blessed.”

“Fuck, I miss him,” Hamlet chokes, and Horatio kisses him again, his mouth, his slippery cheeks, even the black tassel of his cap.

“Me too, dear heart.”

“I come here at night, you know? Every night. And I sense… him. As if part of him loitered here, only invisibly, so what’s the good? I wish we’d put a mirror in the bower. You know. A soulcatcher.”

“But there’s one?”

“...No? What do you mean?” And Hamlet, frowning, pulls back a jot.

Horatio pulls the other way, reluctantly, struggling up from Hamlet’s lap. “Here,” he repeats, pointing to a dark glittering surface that sort of peeps through the vine. The bower is composed of two walls of mesh, with the vine growing in-between, and the small rectangular mirror appears to be trapped between the walls, held in place by the interlacing stems.

“But…” And Hamlet has leapt to his feet, wide-eyed. “That’s not… that’s… that’s Dad’s compact tablet! He bought me the same, the day before I left for Wittenberg.”

And doesn’t Horatio know it. Hamlet and his tablet? Soulmates, before Horatio reclaimed the title. Never once seen apart. Hamlet used to type on it all day long - memos, texts, letters to Dad, BEAUTY IS BREATH for Horatio. Now that he is taking a closer look, Horatio can see that the tablet stuck in the vine is indeed the same brand and format.

“O,” Hamlet says with compact reverence. Then tears his fingers over the meshes in his rash attempt to retrieve the tablet. “I thought he’d lost it - couldn’t find it among his things - or that somebody…” - a knowing look - “... had pinched it. And it was there all the time? But why?”

“Look,” Horatio says, pointing to a spot a few inches above. “Here, see? Where the mesh is broken, and the vine makes a little plateau? I think your Dad set it there, so he could face it from his seat.” More clues fall together, as he remembers the fond emailing to and fro during Hamlet’s German romp. “I may be wrong, but I think he meant to record some sort of message - for you. And then…”

The rest is silence. Whether the vid record was made or not, it was never sent - and the tablet never retrieved - because the recorder died, and the thing slipped between the cracks, to where the vine has kept it from the rain while obscuring it from the public eye.

Hamlet is frantic now, forcing his fingers through the meshes, duelling the tight-knit vine for his legacy. Horatio offers quiet guidance (mostly unheeded) until the tablet eventually resurfaces from its leafy resort, and Hamlet holds it in his hands.

* * *

Horatio offers to leave, once Hamlet and tablet are seen home safely. But Hamlet will have none of it. He is still all tremor, down to his hands that shake so badly Horatio ends up charging the tablet, after Hamlet’s fourth attempt to plug in the charger only scratches the casing.

“I want you to be the first to see him,” he keeps saying, deaf to Horatio’s warning that the tablet might no longer work, or there might be no video, or the autumn drizzles might have gotten there first.

But Hamlet is adamant, so Horatio lets him stand vigil over the still-dark screen and goes to make some tea. He coaxes a few sips into Hamlet, and then, second thoughts kicking in, coaxes Hamlet onto his own lap, duveted in Horatio’s arms, Horatio’s hearbeat a warm and steady reminder.

This proves a wise protocol, because there _is_ a vid recording, and while the sound is off, ruined by the rains, the image is wonderfully intact. July at its peak, the bower brightly sun-dappled, and Hamlet King smiling at them as he speaks words that do not need meaning to be received. Only a few words, though, because a shadow soon breaks into the screen. A shadow ushering in a man, a man that becomes a face, neatly visible when it bends to King’s ear in full view and puts its mouth there - mouthing, mouthing, mouthing - slug-like, evil - because King’s face is turning into a land of ashes - only one hand alive, clutching at his heart through his shirt - until it gives in - and the mouth smiles - and Claudius King turns away from his dead brother to step out lightly.

Horatio’s arms are like vines, holding Hamlet so tight to him he can no longer tell which heartbeat is bruising his chest.

“I knew it,” is all Hamlet says.

He is so quiet. It panics Horatio, how calm Hamlet is, until Hamlet turns in his grip - puts his arms round his neck - and something in Horatio gentles the grip.

“I knew it, but I couldn’t name it,” Hamlet says, fevered-eyed but calm, and now Horatio realizes that King’s spectral message has done what none other could: has put to rest Hamlet's haunting fear that it was his departure, his whim to spend six months away, that broke his father’s heart.

"And now?" 

“Now? We show it. He thinks I'm crazy, did you know? So we make it crazy Hamlet's performance project. And we invite every sponsor of his, every app marketer, _everyone_ to come and watch, and then - then! - I watch his face as they do. Oh, and we find a lip-reading expert, so we'll know which lie he used. And we put it on YouTube.” And give it to the cops at some point, Horatio thinks, but only says "All right."

“It’s going to be a mess, Horatio.”

“Who cares, if it’s what you need.”

“I’m not even sure it’s legally viable. But I want him ruined. I want anyone who ever knew my father to see him for what he is. And I want him never again to touch GERT.” Hamlet is still shaking, but part of it has morphed to the thrill of revenge, electrifying, which Horatio kind of gets - enough that he nods, then shakes his head when Hamlet says “Your thesis…”.

“He made Elsinore a prison,” says Horatio, not wanting to disclose everything yet. It may be his word against Claudius King’s, but anything tops Claudius King signing on his viva. “I’m breaking out, and, sweetheart, so are you.”

Hamlet goes suddenly limp in his arms, and the panic is back a little, but then Hamlet tucks his forehead into Horatio’s neck, his hands still clutching the tablet to his chest, and Horatio understands.

“Tomorrow,” he says. “Tomorrow, we'll set it up. Tonight, though? We sleep.”

“Hmmm” from a Hamlet half dead to the world.

Horatio makes his arms a bower, and sings him to his rest, and is still there when Hamlet opens his eyes again - in the sun - on the morning-end of sleep.


End file.
